Hemp
Here’s a quick video on the virtues of hemp, an extremely inexpensive and versatile industrial product that grows quickly in many regions around the world.
The bad news is that it’s often confused with marijuana, and is thus illegal in most of the 50 states. It also serves as an environmentally benign replacement for everything from cotton to concrete to plastic to laundry detergent, meaning that it’s highly disruptive to many dozens of different highly profitable supply chains; one can only speculate on the number of lobbyists working feverishly to block its progress.
These lobbyists are clearly going to fail, probably sometime in the next administration; the laws criminalizing marijuana will be rescinded at the federal level and most of the states. The power of the alcohol industry is the only thing keeping them in place, but that’s failing, and public support for legalization is strong: 63%, for recreational purposes,93% for medical).
Craig,
You are quite correct, the demonization of Hemp, including marijuana, has proved a disaster for the US and the rest of the world.
The puritanical, heavy handed US law enforcement approach has ruined lives, spread corruption and diverted vast sums of public money into pointless and repressive campaigns to the point where the US and other nations following the same policies, are conducting a viscous civil war against a significant percentage of their populations.
Not only are the opponents of Hemp/marijuana futile and hypocritical, but the policies are counter-productive.
The whole campaign has been a 70 year exercise in stubborn madness. This self-serving insanity has seen a fairly harmless vice and useful agricultural product grow into a scourge of epidemic proportions fueled entirely by the ill conceived investment in prohibitionist law enforcement campaigns.
The greatest and most tragic aspect of the whole sorry saga was the anti-marijuana campaign grew from the disaster of a lessen unlearned from the monumental failure of the Volstead act.
I have never believed in prohibitionist law enforcement campaigns to control victimless “crime”. Citizens, not government agencies, are the best judges of how they wish to conduct their personal moral beliefs and practices.
All aspects of individual human behavior will be imperfect on occasion, but citizens must be allowed a measure of personal responsibility and the freedom to make bad choices.
As Churchill observed,”the way to destroy all respect for law, is to enact 10,000 laws” !
Craig, the alcohol industry has never “lobbied” against hemp or marijuana. Alcohol sales would be unaffected by legalization of marijuana, in fact beer sales may actually rise.
People seek different recreational substances for different reasons and motivations.
The saddest and most ludicrous news item I witnessed recently was a large number of police dressed in combat attire, looking as if invading a Taliban stronghold, arresting what appeared to be a large number of pot plants” ! The stern faced police commander announced a “major’ international drug ring had been destroyed, and a the operation was another success in the ongoing war against the drug scourge taking the lives of so many young people”.
Woeful !
A friend of mine is a famous criminal barrister, and related an even more tragic tale. He recently represented a young client who had no previous criminal record but had grown an entire green house of marijuana for the use of himself and his fellow university students.
Although the Prosecution admitted the was no commercial aspect to the crime, in that he wasn’t selling the fruits of his labour, the enterprise was deemed commercial since his fellow student had saved money the would noramlly have spent purchasing illegal drugs from street dealers !
The elderly judge passed a six year term of imprisonment, observing, ” If my fellow judges would just sentence as harshly, the sale of illegal drugs would cease within a short time “.
I’m relieved to say the Appellate Court quashed both the sentence and conviction.
The whole thing would have seemed like a farcical skit on a comedy show, if the consequences weren’t so dreadfully tragic.
The scourge of modern, chemically synthesized, and truly deadly drugs available today, are a direct consequence of the wilful, irresponsible, unconscionable law enforcement madness inflicted on the world by the US DOE, and US government misinformation propaganda.
Hemp cultivation isn’t really “highly disruptive to many dozens of different highly profitable supply chains”. Large scale hemp production, like any agricultural crop, comes with it’s fair share of production cost and problems.
In some areas hemp can prove competitive, in others far less so. The proponents of hemp cultivation are a little over enthusiastic and idealistic in their claims, but the lobbyists you imagine don’t really exist.
Instead, those powerful lobbyist groups are not representing any commercial interests, instead they are a coalition of religious, anti-drug, law enforcement, prisons etc, all of whom rely on ant-drug laws to stay in existence.
In monetary terms, the anti-drug-law enforcement industry is much larger than the illicit drug trade!
The US Drug Enforcement Administration, which is just an agency of the US Department of Justice has a budget of $ 3 billion and an authorized “clandestine” budget of $ 1.3 billion.
This budget is relatively small in comparison to the budgets of more than 18 other US agencies also “fighting the war on drugs”. When State, and local law enforcement agencies are included, the expenditure runs into $ Trillions.
Like many other US agencies, the DEA has interfered in the political processes of foreign nations for over half a century.
With the exception of Carter, all US Presidents found the “getting tough” in war on drugs an easy method of gaining popularity. The currant President is more sincere than most in his opposition to substance abuse, but still lacks insight.
That is both good and bad. All drugs are bad, even if you can’t overdose on them. But on the other hand, that would mean that hemp would be legal too. Hemp is a green alternative to many things as you mentioned and is not covered in thc, therefore unable to make you high. The problem with marijuana, which is coated with thc, is that it can damage brain development permanently and can cause people to forget. Another thing is that the effects of alcohol are 14x worse when with marijuana. this would definitely increase the death rate for DUI’s.